Don't worry—it's nothing like pumpkin beers.

This is Foaming at the Mouth, Joshua M. Bernstein’s hopped-up adventures in the ever-expanding universe of beer. And yes, he would like another round, please.

Maple syrup is a breakfast essential, dark sticky rivers flowing across pancakes, waffles, and fluffy French toast. Mornings mean maple syrup, but if brewers have their way, afternoons and evenings will as well.

From Vermont (duh) to Virginia (huh) and all points near and far a forest, brewers are tapping into maple syrup and sap to add flavor and feel-good nostalgia to beer. “Maple syrup is kind of like grandma’s cookies. There’s a warmness in that memory,” says Robbie O’Cain, brewmaster at Virginia’s Starr Hill.

Maple syrup might satisfy your sweet tooth at lunch, but that's not really replicated in beer. Maple syrup is mostly sugar, a feast for yeast to crunch and convert into alcohol. “With maple syrup, it’s really hard to get the sweetness in there,” says 14th Star brewmaster Dan Sartwell. “Anything sweet is going to get fermented and converted to alcohol.” Left behind is maple syrup’s robust flavor, cavities not included.

Courtesy of 14th Star Brewing Company

Photo: Courtesy of 14th Star

Brewing with maple syrup comes naturally in St. Albans, Vermont, home to the state’s annual maple festival. “It’s a local product that we’re passionate about,” he says. His maple-infused beers include a brown ale, the caramel-toast character a natural match to maple, and Maple Breakfast Stout.“The idea was to have an entire breakfast in a glass,” Sartwell says. “We used biscuit malts to re-create pancakes, coffee, oats for oatmeal, and maple syrup to top it all off.” Sartwell favors dark maple syrup in the Grade B ballpark, which leaves a stronger flavor in the beer.

That was Starr Hill’s move with Last Leaf Maple Brown Ale, its new fall seasonal. “Without the boldness, it’s going to get lost, especially competing against all the other flavors of the beer,” O’Cain says. He constructed Last Leaf with local Virginia maple syrup and complementary richer malts, vanilla, and classified spices to boost the maple character. The result is a beer that sweetly recalls that first chilly fall morning, foliage coloring, as familiar as a well-worn sweater. “This isn’t like drinking maple syrup,” he says.

It’s also not like drinking pumpkin ale. Last Leaf replaced Boxcar Pumpkin Porter in the rotation, a sign that perhaps we’ve reached peak gourd. “Pumpkin fatigue is real,” he says.

“No one goes, ‘Oh, I want to eat pumpkins. Pumpkins are delicious,’” says Cambria Griffith, the Bruery’s distribution marketing manager. With Autumn Maple, the Californians sub pumpkins for yams, accented with nutmeg, molasses, and organic maple syrup. “It’s one of those ingredients that rounds out all the flavors,” she says.

Courtesy of The Bruery

Photo: Courtesy of The Bruery

Autumn Maple’s warming notes of allspice and cinnamon make it Thanksgiving by the bottle. Which is no accident. “We are not shy about loving food,” Griffiths says. Next month, the Bruery will release the Grade, a strong Baltic porter infused with maple syrup and fenugreek. Seems odd until you sniff. “I smelled fenugreek, and it’s like sticking your face in maple syrup,” Griffith says. (Fun fact: Fenugreek seeds contain sotolon, a chemical compound used to fashion artificial maple syrup.)

Sap ain’t like the amber stuff at IHOP. “Really, it’s water,” says Christopher Basso, CEO and brewmaster of the Hudson Valley’s Newburgh Brewing. “It’s very faintly earthy and not very maple-y. It tastes nothing like maple syrup. The sap is so delicate, the flavor easily gets lost.”

Basso’s sap experiments have focused on lighter styles, including a farmhouse ale funked with wild yeast and a crisp pilsner, the sap’s earthy, woody essence showcased on the finish.

Vermont's 14th Star makes Naked Maple Ale for the annual festival. The beer is a love poem to all things maple, including sap, maple wood–smoked malt, maple syrup, and maple chips for aging. And next year’s version might up the syrupy ante. “We’re looking into possibly aging the beer in a maple barrel,” Sartwell says.

An all-maple beer in a mapling town is a sappy sentiment worth supporting.